HOST: Protein Pulse Drive Time. Wednesday Watchlist, October 21st. From The Sparks Group.

SHAWN: Everybody wants to talk about opening more crossings for Mexican cattle. That's worth watching, but opening a gate doesn't put finished cattle on the rail tomorrow. USDA is moving toward additional cattle-entry points while Washington considers incentives to retain breeding heifers. One could expand feeder availability. The other could keep more females out of the immediate beef pipeline. Meanwhile, imported lean is telling its own story. Domestic cow slaughter is down, but imported trimming values have been under pressure. More than one supply channel determines what processors actually pay. Price the cattle available, not the cattle promised.

HOST: Choice advanced one seventy-two to three seventy-three thirty. Select rose one sixty-three to three sixty-one fifty-four. Imported frozen nineties at three thirteen C-I-F East Coast. Pork cutout at seventy-eight fifty-three, down eighty-six cents. Bellies at eighty-nine sixty-seven. Chicken breast at one seventeen. Thigh at one seventy-three.

SHAWN: Columbus is scheduled to reopen October 26th. Nogales is conditionally targeted for November 30th. Australia has hit its reported annual beef-import quota. Kayem is recalling about one point five eight million pounds. Margin is determined by actual product economics, not the headline direction of the market. Stay disciplined.

HOST: Protein Pulse Drive Time. Shawn Sparks, The Sparks Group.

SHAWN: Stay disciplined.